Woke Up This Morning
by RCB
Summary: Every morning in Robby “Two Gun” Dicapella’s life is pretty much the same. Until it isn’t. General spoilers for Season Four. Language. Violence. Beta by mrstotten @ livejournal. This is what happens when I can’t get a song out of my head.


Woke Up This Morning

~*~

_I woke up this morning, got myself a gun_

~*~

"So help me…"

"It wasn't my fault, okay?"

"Explain to me how getting brains all over my **new fucking shoes** isn't your fault!"

"He turned!"

"He. Turned."

"Robby…"

"Fucking…get a tarp!"

~*~

Robby "Two Gun" DiCapella watched from the car while his younger brother struggled to unload the body into the lake. Tommy dropped the body twice and Robby nearly got out of the car on instinct. He looked after Tommy, it was his _job_ and it killed Robby to watch him struggle with the nearly five hundred pound fat fuck's body. But Tommy wanted to do it himself.

_"It means something, Robby. You know?"_

Yeah, Robby knew.

Tommy finally dumped the mass of lard into the lake, and huffed and puffed his way back to the car while Robby inspected his formerly brand new shoes. The stupid ass got god damn brain matter all over them. That shit never came out, and besides, now they were evidence. Not that they had much to worry about from the locals, but the fucking feds had been sniffing around again.

Tommy tore the passenger side door open, still out of breath. Robby opened his mouth to bitch some more about his shoes and changed his mind. Tommy fucked up because he was nervous. The fat fuck had connections sure, but none of that mattered any more. The old bastard was done, finito.

Tommy got inside, one hand rubbing at the back of his neck, and cracked a smile at Robby.

"Spaghetti eatin' motha fucker should have tried Atkins or some shit."

Robby laughed all the way back to the shop.

~*~

The house was silent and dark; Pops was already in bed when they got home. They had checked in by phone after the job, and judging by the empty bottle of Johnny Blue on the side table, the old man had himself a celebratory drink. Or ten.

Tommy went straight for the stairs, but Robby lingered at the kitchen.

He could almost smell the familiar scent of cinnamon and vanilla perfume. A phantom of course, since no one had made anything calling for cinnamon, or wore that kind of perfume in years.

When he was sure that Tommy was all the way up the stairs, Robby opened the spice cupboard and uncapped the cinnamon jar. Tommy wouldn't understand, he couldn't understand. He was too little when…

Robby took a small whiff of the pungent cinnamon while he stared at a spot just near the back door. _The_ spot near the back door.

He had no idea why he tortured himself that way.

~*~

Robby was sure that he'd feel different that morning, but it started the same as any other day. He pulled his gun from under his pillow, carried it with him to the bathroom and took the hottest shower that his skin could stand. When he got dressed, he grabbed his gun, slipped it into his back waistband, and banged twice on Tommy's door on his way down the hallway.

Pops was reading the newspaper at the table and grunted at him, same as always. After Robby grabbed a cup of coffee, Tommy came staggering in rubbing sleep out of his blood shot eyes, barely beating the clock before it struck seven A.M.

Just like every morning.

No excuse to sleep in, Pops always said, unless you were dead.

"You burn everything?" Pops asked. His eyes were still glued to the sports section, not even bothering to look at them.

"Yes, sir," Tommy answered while Robby stared at the spice cabinet.

"Sorry about your shoes," Tommy said as soon as Pops got up and left the room.

"Yeah," Robby accepted his apology while he stared at the floor in front of the stove.

"God damn shame about it."

~*~

Every hit had repercussions, and Pops wanted them out of town and laying low for awhile. Especially after a hit of this significance.

Tommy wanted to go to Florida, but Robby hated Miami and the fake people with their fake tits, and injecting fucking botulism into their faces.

Miami was crazy shit, and he was pissed he had to leave in the first place.

"Well, where we goin' then?" Tommy demanded to know.

"Get in the car asshat," Robby ordered, throwing the rest of their things into the trunk of the Cadillac.

Tommy made a pissy noise, and slammed the door harder than was necessary, but Robby didn't comment.

Tommy did as he was told, which, was a fucking miracle these days.

He didn't bother to answer Tommy, though. Mainly because he had no clue other than West. Something about it felt right, and he couldn't remember the last time they'd taken a road trip together.

When Robby glanced at Tommy's pitched and pissy looking face, he thought that maybe a road trip wasn't the best idea.

But he cranked up the music, and put it in drive anyway.

~*~

"You gonna marry Carlie?" Tommy asked out of the blue halfway across Kansas.

"Fuck, no," Robby grimaced at the very idea of looking at her pissed off, sour, bitchy face for the rest of his life.

"You knock her up, and Pops will make you," Tommy advised needlessly.

"I know how to work a cockhat, thanks," Robby tossed back sarcastically.

"Really? How'd the chick get knocked up in high school? What was her name again?" Tommy pretended that he couldn't remember.

"Fuck you, prick. You know her name," Robby growled without looking at his brother.

"Oh, right. _Danielle_." Tommy's voice sounded like a kindergartener. Robby punched him in the shoulder for the hell of it.

"Shut up, asshole," Robby warned.

"She was a bitch, dude. You dodged the bullet on that one," Tommy continued on.

"Don't call her a bitch," Robby pointed a finger at him.

"Are you kidding? She went and got an abortion without even asking you what you wanted to do, man. She's a fucking bitch," Tommy kept going.

"No, she didn't," Robby thought his jaw would crack from trying to make it move.

"What?"

"She didn't, okay? She lost it."

Tommy was silent, and Robby didn't bother to look at him for another fifty miles.

"Hey, I didn't know. I mean, everybody at school said…"

"Yeah, I know what they said."

"How come you never told me?"

"I dunno," Robby lied. The truth was that Pops wouldn't have had to make Robby marry Danielle. He bought a ring and proposed exactly a week after she told him that she was pregnant. She was the one. But then…well, things happen.

Like losing the baby, and it hurt to even look Danielle in the face after that. Like his Pops reminding him what happened to women in their family. Like her family moving her away because they didn't want to see her end up with "a bum" like him.

"You want some music?" Tommy asked, one hand on the volume already.

"Yeah, I want some music."

~*~

"This town sucks ass," Tommy bitched for the hundredth time. "They ain't even got a decent strip joint."

"Here, have another," Robby slid him a full shot.

"All the whiskey in the world isn't going to make that look like a fine piece of ass," Tommy complained, pointing to the aging stripper. She looked winded as she tried to wind her way round the pole, probably an act she perfected in much younger days.

"Don't count out whiskey." Was all Robby could say.

"Dude, this place? This is the pasture where old strippers go to die," Tommy continued on before tipping the glass back, and slamming it down on the table.

"Not that bad," Robby shrugged. "There's a card game in the back. Bet they'd let you in."

"Why are we even _in_ Buttfuck, Minnesota?" Tommy demanded and Robby slid him another glass.

He still didn't have an answer.

~*~

In the back room of the shittiest strip club in America was where it all started to go bad. Robby didn't even to hear the first gun shot, he just _knew_ something was going down. His gun was in his hand, he was on his feet and halfway to the faded, crumbling door marked private before he heard the second gunshot.

The door was locked, and he kicked it down, nothing on his mind but Tommy.

Three seconds and sixteen bullets later, he dragged his baby brother across the piles of blood splattered cash and scattered playing cards.

~*~

Three states later Robby finally pulled over and they slept for two days.

~*~

"Dude, I'm out," Tommy swallowed nervously.

"You need to lay off that shit anyway," Robby scowled.

"I told you I was running low in Nevada!" Tommy yelled, pacing and running both hands through his hair. The result was that it stood wildly on end, and combined with his blood shot, wild eyes, he looked completely insane.

"Fucking shit eats up your brain!" Robby yelled back.

"Come on, Robby. I'm dying here," Tommy pleaded. "I can't help myself…"

Fuck, like Robby was supposed to ignore that?

"Ain't gonna score in this one horse town," Robby tried.

"Then let's blow!" Tommy was frantic.

"Maybe this is a good thing," Robby reasoned. "I mean, we take a few days and you can…"

"I'm fucking dying here and you wanna hold an intervention and shit??" Tommy yelled. "Does this look like an episode of Donahue to you?!"

Robby had one answer for that.

Tommy held his face after, big welt already forming, and stared at Robby in shock. "Don't raise your voice to me. Don't."

"I need some, Robby." Tommy had tears in his eyes, and Robby figured that Tommy may as well have cut his heart out.

Robby did what he always did; he took care of his little brother.

~*~

*

_"Robby, hold Tommy for me, will you? That's a good boy."_

"These men just want to talk. But it's grown up stuff so you take Tommy into the living room."

"Mommy's not crying. Just take care of Tommy. Okay, baby? Take care of Tommy." 

~*~

Robby woke up the same way he always did, hand on his gun and a hot shower.

When he got dressed, he grabbed his gun, slipped it into his back waistband and banged twice on Tommy's door on his way down the hallway.

Pops was reading the newspaper at the table and grunted at him, same as always. Just a normal day.

~*~

Every hit had repercussions, and Pops wanted them out of town and laying low for awhile. Especially a hit of this significance.

Tommy wanted to go to Florida, but Robby hated Miami and the fake people with their fake tits, and injecting fucking botulism into their faces.

Miami was crazy shit, and he was pissed he had to leave in the first place.

"Well, where we goin' then?" Tommy demanded to know.

He didn't bother to answer Tommy, though. Mainly because he had no clue other than West. Something about it felt right, and he couldn't remember the last time they'd taken a road trip together.

~*~

He absolutely didn't want to talk about Carlie, or Danielle. He'd already shared too much; and too little at the same time.

"You want some music?" Tommy asked, one hand on the volume already.

"Mom was pretty, Tommy," Robby blurted out. He had no idea where it came from.

Tommy's hand froze on the knob. "Robby?"

"I just think you should know. Pops took all the pictures down. I always hated him for that," Robby went on wondering where the hell all this caring and sharing crap was coming from. This so wasn't his bag and he waited for Tommy to rag on him for it.

Instead, Tommy asked a question that surprised Robby. "What was Pops like? I mean, before."

"Pops?" Robby repeated.

"Yeah, you know. Before the crew and…stuff," Tommy's hand was still frozen on the knob and Robby glanced at it. He had long thin fingers, the kind that should play piano or operate on people.

Not the kind that should be wasted on triggers, and coke spoons. Anything but that.

"The same, really," Robby remembered. "Driven. Worked all the time. The same, just on the other side of the fence," Robby explained.

Tommy just gave a small nod. "You ever wonder what life would have been like, Robby? If things had been different?"

"No," Robby lied. Truth was, he wondered all the time. If Pops hadn't been turned into a single minded, revenge-driven person who turned his only two sons into thugs; weapons that followed orders. If Mom had lived and taught them right from wrong instead of Pops doing it. If right now they just kept driving and never looked back. Now that it was done, finished, he doubted the old man would even bother to look for them.

Tommy pulled his hand away from the radio, and they didn't talk again until Robby found a run down looking strip club in an even more run down town in Minnesota.

Maybe after that Robby would put his theory about Pops to the test.

~*~

Blood looked paler, less red than Robby remembered, and as he pulls his brother out of the room without a scratch on him -_everybody's dead 'cept for Tommy, it's a fucking miracle_- he wonders why.

~*~

Three states later, Robby pulled over and they slept for two days.

~*~

_"Oh God, what's happening? Shit, that skanky bitch sold me SHIT!"_

"Robby? I don't feel so good."

"Hang on, we'll get someone over here! Operator, I need an…"

"Am I gonna go to hell Robby? I don't wanna go to hell."

"What? No. Hell's for dead people and you ain't dyin'. I got you, Tommy. I got you." 

~*~

Robby woke up the same way he always did, hand on his gun and a hot shower.

When he got dressed, he grabbed his gun, slipped it into his back waistband and banged twice on Tommy's door on his way down the hallway.

Pops was reading the newspaper at the table and grunted at him, same as always.

~*~

"I don't wanna talk about Carlie," Robbie grunted. He was in a pissy mood. Everything looked _strange_ and he couldn't put his finger on it. Even Tommy, his brother seemed…weird. Like he was there, but he wasn't. Robby had been hungover before, but this was damned ridiculous.

And then the crazy ass dreams…

"I'm supposed to be taking care of you, and I think I'm doing it all wrong," Robby blurted out and Tommy quirked an eyebrow.

"Huh?"

"I don't know. Nothing," Robby mumbled quickly. What the HELL?

"I don't need taking care of," Tommy pointed out.

"You're my brother. You always need taking care of," Robby informed him.

"Whatever," Tommy sighed and grabbed for his stash under the seat. Robby didn't know why, but he was completely enraged in an instant.

"Don't even think about snorting that shit in front of me." Robby grabbed the bag out of Tommy's hand and abruptly threw it out the window.

"What. The. Fuck!?!?" Tommy demanded, looking out the back window in shock. "Go back, mother fucker!"

"No," Robby refused, not sure himself what his damn problem was.

Tommy screamed at him, punched him, and Robby just sat stoic, making sure to keep the Caddy on the road.

He saw a promising exit in Minnesota and took it. The city was shit, but hey, there was a strip club.

~*~

They make it to Nevada and then to California, but Robby's not sure how. He can remember most of it, but large parts are a blur.

**Crazy ass dreams-and wait, there should be blood, right?**

Somewhere, at the strip club Robby thinks, Tommy managed to score some dope. But he's out now and completely freaking out.

Robby does the only thing he knows how. He takes care of Tommy.

**But where is the blood?**

~*~

Robby woke up the same way he always did, hand on his gun and a hot shower.

Except this time, when he came out of the bathroom with his gun in his hand, there was a tall man in his bed room.

"Who the fuck are you?" Robby demands of the intruder holding a shotgun. In his _own_ damn house. He's getting aced in his own house? Poetic as hell, but, no. No fucking way. Not like…

"You're dead. Your brother is dead," the guy said, and something too bright flashed and Robby covered his eyes. Just as fast as it had come, it was gone.

"If you touched my brother, you sick fuck…" Robby advanced on him, shot gun or no. Not Tommy…

"I didn't. He died of a combination of a gun shot wound and an overdose. Here. In this room," the man went on, eyes hard and glinting.

"Fuck you, asshole!" Robby told him, and made for the door. His Pops was downstairs, reading the paper and five seconds after Robby sat at the breakfast table, Tommy would be down, rubbing sleep out of his eyes and looking like shit as always.

"I'm guessing it was accidental. You got a hold of some bad stuff, and when he died, you shot yourself in the head," the man went on and dammit if the door to his bedroom was locked. The crazy fucker, from who knew which crew, had managed to trap him inside.

"I…I wrote a paper about your family once. Back in Stanford," he went on. Robby had enough; he didn't know which crew sent this whacked out hitter, but Robby was gonna find out and send him back in pieces. God damn, teeny tiny pieces.

"I'll kill you," Robby promised and headed in his direction.

The shot gun went off and Robby's world exploded in a thousand tiny pieces.

_"Mommy's not crying. Just take care of Tommy. Okay, baby? Take care of Tommy." _

Robby woke up that morning the same way he always did, hand on his gun followed by a hot shower. It felt…off somehow, but Robby attributed it to the victory beers the night before. They finally killed the son of a bitch that aced their mother. They'd had to work their way through the whole damn food chain to do it, but it was done.

But other than all that, still, same kind of morning as always.

Except when he came out, it wasn't his room. It was some hotel room, and there was a guy standing there with a shot gun pointed at him.

"What the fuck?" Robby demanded. How the hell did…

Something bright flashed, illuminating the whole room and Robby put up his hand to block it out. His bedroom was gone, replaced by something else that he strained to make out. But as quick as it had come, it vanished.

The guy looked familiar. His clothes were…weird, and he seriously needed a better haircut.

"I have to take care of Tommy. He's my kid brother," Robby blurted out, not sure why he was saying _that_ or why he'd tell this dweeb anything, anyway. The guy blanched a little and then his face hardened again.

"I don't know how you're doing it, but it's you. Somehow you're keeping the both of you here," the man went on.

Robby suddenly realized what was off. His hand went to his neck, and all he felt was smooth skin.

"You fucking robbed me?" Robby demanded. "You son of a bitch!!"

The shot gun went off before Robby took his first step.

~*~

When Robby woke up that last morning, it wasn't the same as every other morning.

He wasn't at home, his gun was missing and there was a man there, holding Robby's mother's crucifix in his hand over a burning trash can.

He remembered the man, like a ghost in the back of his mind.

"Tommy?!!?" Robby yelled, but his brother didn't answer. The man gave Robby a strange expression, a mixture of anger, heart breaking sorrow, and pity. His free hand closed around some weird amulet, and his eyes were tinged pink.

And then he dropped Robby's crucifix into the fire.

Robby burned and he didn't stop burning for two decades.

~*~

_When I woke up this morning everything I had was gone. By half past ten my head was going ding-dong. Ringing like a bell from my head down to my toes, like a voice telling me there was something I should know._

~*~

There's a reward and Robby intends to win it.

He's got an advantage over everyone else and he aims to use it. Back when he was still human, before everything good and clean was cut away (which he freely admits didn't take too long, the only thing missing was everything _Tommy_), he learned a thing or two about psychology. It wasn't from some classroom or some textbook. No, Robby "Two Guns" DiCapella gained his expertise from practice, practice, practice.

"I met your brother once," Robby whispered when his turn in line finally came.

His words were met by a single wide eye, and Robby smiled. Robby had his undivided attention.

Good.

"I know what they told you about Sam," Robby went on and there was a gurgle in answer. Alastair handed Robby the knives, and Robby accepted them because he knew enough not to piss off the Head Demon In Charge.

But he didn't intend on using them, his black sharp tongue would do all the slicing and digging. Robby had done all kinds of homework.

Robby whispered, one hand cupped over the damned man's ear. "You want the real, honest truth? Huh? From one big brother to another?"

He couldn't answer Robby, the stubborn son of a bitch didn't have a tongue at the moment, but his one good eye did enough talking.

"Yeah, that's right. I got a kid brother myself," Robby went on and he didn't know why this guy, _Dean Winchester_, was so damned important, and Robby didn't care.

He was on Robby's metaphorical hook, and that was what was important.

"I'd do anything for him," Robby went on. "What about you?"

_Yes_ His darting, desperate eye said.

Robby knew he was lucky. He'd planned and plotted and he timed his wait in line because he could _hear_ the guy breaking from halfway across Hell. Sure, maybe he'd held out a long time, but no one could hold out forever. Shit, Robby had silently rooted a little for him, but Hell was all about breaking and it was just a matter of time.

If the fucker was gonna break, then he was gonna break to Robby's advantage. Make lemonade out of lemons and all that jazz.

In the end, after more urgent whisperings from Robby, Dean Winchester finally broke. After he climbed down off the rack, Robby gave Dean his meager reward.

He told Dean the truth, everything he knew, and Dean was more than a little pissed that it amounted to very little.

Robby was Dean's first victim.

Robby waited it out as best he could; wasn't enough to get him to come down, had to get him to join in. When it was over, one long year later, Alastair paid Robby his reward.

Robby cherished each and every one of the ten minutes he'd earned with Tommy. And it wasn't quite what Robby had pictured. Twisted, broken, perverted version of their former selves; they were denizens of Hell now. There wasn't anything profound to say, not there, not in Hell. They examined each others scars, made small talk about how they were earned.

But they were still brothers.

For ten minutes, they were brothers again.

Tommy was Dean Winchester's second victim.

Somewhere, deep within his broken, black and twisted soul, Dean remembered what it was to be a brother.

He let Robby watch.

~*~

_I woke up this morning. All the love has gone, Papa never told me about right and wrong._

Mama always said I'd be the chosen one.

God damn shame about it.

~*~

Fin


End file.
